Tag: man alive

It’s January 1st of a brand new year. 365 days untainted from the past. Right?

Well sort of.

The challenge is we bring same old us into the beautiful untarnished new year. Same thinking. Same struggles. Same habits. Same everything.

But, one thing that is different is that we BELIEVE in the newness. We HOPE in the new beginning. And rightly so. We should.

Here’s what we have to do to really have new.

STOP something that is robbing you from the new. Don’t pick 20 things and expect to overhaul your entire life today. It’s not going to happen and you’ll get frustrated and bail the entire NEW YOU project before it gets traction.

Also, PICK a NEW START Goal too. Just One.

Just pick a thing to STOP and a thing to START.

Stop now and pick those 2 things. 1 STOP. 1 START.

THEN remember this.

You don’t manage goals. You manage DECISIONS. Literally nanoseconds are what you manage. It’s in those nanoseconds where the new you takes on new life and the old you begins to fade away.

When you feel the OLD you wanting to do the OLD thing…you manage that moment. That nanosecond and choose the NEW. And you do so over and over until a new HABIT is formed.

You manage emotions and feelings. You manage the inner voice. The real battle is won within before it shows up in life.

Then YOU do it again and again and again. Over and over.

When you fall short you recommit.

When you fall short evaluate and identify what happened? What needs to change in order for you to win more? Adjust and go again.

That’s how a NEW you will come to life this year and how an OLD you will die.

However, as time goes on, my reflection and lessons from it have become more intentional.

Today is no exception.

I went through my entire 2018 calendar. Every meeting, whether personal or professional was looked at. I keep a very meticulous calendar and every appointment on it was looked at.

The goal was to identify where I felt my time had been invested or had a good return and to also identify where I felt my time was wasted. I identified people who were fun to hang out with… people who made it easy to be there friend… people who were going somewhere… people who I shared common interests with… and a few more insights. From those insights, I made notes of how to make better use of my time in 2019; where to invest it more and where to not waste it.

I also went through all of my 2019 goals (again). This time was the point of no return though.

I went through each one to make sure they were relevant and that each of them had obvious action plans with them. I also made sure that if each of them were my 2019 goals, that I was 100% committed to make them happen. I want to make sure that I am fully vested in each of them so that come tomorrow, I can go all in and not look back.

One came from something I read about the average lifespan in the US being 30,000 days. 30,000 days is just over 82 years.

I’m 55 (born in 1963) and when I read that I immediately did the math. In theory, I have almost exactly 10,000 days to live.

Out of those two thoughts, 10,000 days was born.

For Christmas all I asked for was 10,000 pennies. They are meant to be an icon of sorts to represent how I am investing each of my 10,000 days. I am keeping them in a box and I’ll move them from that box to another. One penny a day.

Each morning, I’ll “move a penny” and give serious intent to what I’ll do with that day. Whether it’s as a man, husband, father, granddad (AKA Dapa G), professional or other area of life…I hope to be on point on a very regular basis.

Each evening, I’ll reflect on how well I did.

What did I do well and what did I waste time on.

The goal is to keep raising my “living intentionally” score over time.

10,000 days will be the place that I write about both my ups and downs…my successes and losses…etc.

The goal is to not only inspire myself with the blog and pennies, but to also inspire you as well.

Stay tuned and join in. Also, I’d love for you to share this with others so they too can become more intentional with their life. Day by day. Penny by penny.